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Romney's Mormon faith in spotlight

The prophecy is apocryphal — it was supposedly said in May 1843, but not recorded anywhere until 50 years later — but Smith’s separate, fully documented comments that believers would be “the staff upon which the nation shall lean and they shall bear the Constitution away from the very verge of destruction,” is key to Mormons’ mindset, even if they’re not sure what to do with the White Horse itself.

“That’s a folklore — we’ve heard it, and I think everybody’s heard it. It’s been out there for many years,” said Robert McKim, a Republican Wyoming state representative and a Mormon. “The next question some people ask me, ‘Well, you think Mitt Romney’s that person?’ I say, ‘I don’t have no idea about that.’ I really don’t worry about it, because I believe we have prophets at the head of the church, and I think if that time comes, they’ll tell us. It’s a passing comment that you don’t speculate on, because you have no way to prove or disprove it.”

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David Campbell, a Mormon himself and professor at Notre Dame who has studied his fellow church members’ views on the prophecy, as well as the intersection of the church and politics, said McKim’s far from alone.

“If you asked a more general question, ‘Do you believe that one day the Constitution will hang by a thread and it will be a Mormon who saves it?’ we know from data that I’ve collected that many Mormons actually do endorse that idea, but they would not necessarily know that that came from something known as the White Horse prophecy,” Campbell said. “They just know that there’s going to be a time of Constitutional crisis maybe, and it will be a member of the LDS faith who will come and save things.”

McKim and a range of other Mormons interviewed say they have heard congregants at their churches and other friends bring up the prophecy as they talk about Romney’s candidacy. No, they don’t believe it themselves. Yes, they know people who do. No, they’re not thrilled to hear their fellow Mormons bringing up the prophecy, and they’re not anxious to have it get the wider exposure they’re confident Romney’s candidacy will create.

“I hear it from some of my colleagues who happen to be members of the church sometimes, and I choose to focus on the things over which we have control and try to do what I believe,” said State Sen. Jerry Lewis, a Republican and also a Mormon.

Romney’s only touched upon the issue briefly. In 2007, at the outset of his first White House run, he told the Salt Lake Tribune he hadn’t heard his name associated with the White Horse, and pointed out that the prophecy isn’t official doctrine. “There are a lot of things that are speculation and discussion by church members and even church leaders that aren’t official church doctrine. I don’t put that at the heart of my religious belief,” he told the paper.

Most people still don’t understand the religion — 50 percent surveyed in a November 2011 Pew poll said they know “not very much/nothing” about it. Some think it’s unnerving. Those Pew numbers showed 65 percent of people saying Mormonism was very different from their own religion, and nearly a quarter picking words to describe the LDS church like cult, polygamy, restrictive, strange.

That helps explain the undertow of anxiety beneath the wave of favorite-son pride washing through LDS wards around the country: They’ve already had more than their fill of polygamy jokes and mocking of temple rituals, and worry that the spotlight on Romney’s candidacy is about to produce many, many more.

“It is a mix of excitement and a little bit of concern, although I think most Mormons figure in the long run it will be for the good of the church. But with increased visibility will come more scrutiny, and probably more criticism,” said LaVarr Webb, a Mormon and former campaign manager for Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt. “Deep down there’s still this concern about, ‘Will we be accepted? Will we be viewed as strange?’”

The LDS Church distanced itself from the White Horse prophecy almost immediately. “It is simply false: that is all there is to it,” then-President Joseph F. Smith (not the original Joseph Smith) declared to a church leadership meeting in 1918.

But 70 years later, Ezra Taft Benson, who became the first Mormon Cabinet secretary when Dwight Eisenhower appointed him head of the Agriculture Department and later rose to be the 13th president of the LDS church, was still talking about the main idea behind the White Horse.

If you conservaturd idiots want to bring up a 20 year old relationship based on faith with Wright, then good ole' Mormon doctrine is fair game. So I want answers to 1) the Joe Smith Pedophile questions 2) Magical Mormon Undies 3) The seer stones and magical hat 4) The magical tablets and 5) Let us into your temples just like you can visit a synagogue or a catholic church anytime. If you are hiding something, it is for a reason.

Are you kidding me? First the Bain attacks backfire with the Democratic and Obama surrogates rushing to defend Mitt Romney AND Bain itself so now Obama and his liberal media lapdogs are going to target Mormonism where the DEMOCRATIC leader of the senate Harry Reid is a Mormon (Of course the author decided not to mention this in the article) as is other prominent Democrats.

Is team Obama going to attack fellow Democrats within their ranks? Are they going to call the leader of the senate a kook?

Slow news day politico? Funny thing - haven't really seen much about it in the spotlight but if you want to put it there go right ahead but then put wright spotlight right up there with it. This is NOT about religion - this is about taking our country back.

"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is politically neutral and does not endorse or promote any candidate, party or platform. Accordingly, we hope that the campaign practices of political candidates would not suggest that their candidacy is supported by or connected to the church.

"The so-called 'White Horse Prophecy' is based on accounts that have not been substantiated by historical research and is not embraced as Church doctrine."

I hope that Gov. Romney’s faith guides and sustains him. I hope it helps him lead a good, honest, and true life. One dedicated to love and happiness, not only for himself and his family, but equally for the community of mankind he is a part of.

I know that is what others gain from their faith and devotion to God.

However, the policies that Gov. Romney puts forth would raise taxes on the poor, cut medical care to the sick, cut food going to the hungry, and cut pensions for the elderly.

Gov. Romney would at the same time massively increase government spending on guns and bombs, purchased from super wealthy arms merchants. Merchants who just happen to be campaign / PAC contributors.

Gov. Romney would at the same time cut taxes on rich people, causing massive debt and deficits.

So, I’m happy to know that Gov. Romney presents himself as a pious, righteous man.

Romney intends forcing 99% of Americans to make sacrifices while he sacrifices nothing except his time hiding his enormous wealth in off-shore accounts and secret Swiss banks. He has gained a much-deserved reputation as a flip-flopper, but he has maintained that most dishonorable trait of supporting other Americans’ involuntary sacrifices when he is exempt from giving anything. There is a reason Americans dislike Romney the more they learn about him, and as the general election campaign heats up and more Americans learn that he dodged the draft after protesting to send other young Americans to their death in Viet Nam, they will despise him. As Americans learn that his economic plan entails every other American making sacrifices to enrich Willard Romney and his wealthy friends, they will discover that besides being a chicken-hawk and a coward, that he is nothing more than a low-life charlatan.

The EVIL MORMONS were EXILED to the BARREN WASTELAND of UTAH hundreds of years ago by GOOD CHRISTIAN AMERICA who saw the satanic MORMONS for what they really. were . AS MOST FLED to UTAH , many MORMONS sought refuge in the dark depths of the earth ,,closer to their real HOME &MASTER. these MORMONS became the MORLOCKS, hideous foul creatures that where known to but a few ON THE EARTHS SURFACE,, like HG WELLS who described them very clearly . NOW the MORMON PUPPET WILLARD 666 ROMNEY is poised to revenge the mormon exile , SEIZE ABSOLUTE POWER and ESTABLISH a MORMON REICH in AMERICA ; his evil ARMY the L.D.S. LEGIONS of DISCIPLES of SATAN, are already on the MARCH,the MORMON ARMY is soon to be joined by the MORLOCKS who shall ascend from the depths of the EARTH . This prophecy has been fortold to be happening now in this times by many scholars and prophets and must be stopped to save AMERICA,, from the evil MORMONS. WAKE UP CHRISTIAN AMERICA, BEFORE it is too LATE

The EVIL MORMONS were EXILED to the BARREN WASTELAND of UTAH hundreds of years ago by GOOD CHRISTIAN AMERICA who saw the satanic MORMONS for what they really. were . AS MOST FLED to UTAH , many MORMONS sought refuge in the dark depths of the earth ,,closer to their real HOME &MASTER. these MORMONS became the MORLOCKS, hideous foul creatures that where known to but a few ON THE EARTHS SURFACE,, like HG WELLS who described them very clearly . NOW the MORMON PUPPET WILLARD 666 ROMNEY is poised to revenge the mormon exile , SEIZE ABSOLUTE POWER and ESTABLISH a MORMON REICH in AMERICA ; his evil ARMY the L.D.S. LEGIONS of DISCIPLES of SATAN, are already on the MARCH,the MORMON ARMY is soon to be joined by the MORLOCKS who shall ascend from the depths of the EARTH . This prophecy has been fortold to be happening now in this times by many scholars and prophets and must be stopped to save AMERICA,, from the evil MORMONS. WAKE UP CHRISTIAN AMERICA, BEFORE it is too LATE

The EVIL MORMONS were EXILED to the BARREN WASTELAND of UTAH hundreds of years ago by GOOD CHRISTIAN AMERICA who saw the satanic MORMONS for what they really. were . AS MOST FLED to UTAH , many MORMONS sought refuge in the dark depths of the earth ,,closer to their real HOME &MASTER. these MORMONS became the MORLOCKS, hideous foul creatures that where known to but a few ON THE EARTHS SURFACE,, like HG WELLS who described them very clearly . NOW the MORMON PUPPET WILLARD 666 ROMNEY is poised to revenge the mormon exile , SEIZE ABSOLUTE POWER and ESTABLISH a MORMON REICH in AMERICA ; his evil ARMY the L.D.S. LEGIONS of DISCIPLES of SATAN, are already on the MARCH,the MORMON ARMY is soon to be joined by the MORLOCKS who shall ascend from the depths of the EARTH . This prophecy has been fortold to be happening now in this times by many scholars and prophets and must be stopped to save AMERICA,, from the evil MORMONS. WAKE UP CHRISTIAN AMERICA, BEFORE it is too LATE

The photo with Romney and the stained glass window is old, and not reflective of Romney for president.

Romneys faith does not use such sybols anyway. I wonder which reporter strained to get him with this background? Anyway it has been overplayed for weeks now. Give it a rest. he is not running for paster in chief